Sunday, July 26, 2009

Just updating here to include the images of the Big Bang Theory bag given out at the WB booth, and the large banner of the same art that hung over the booth. you can tell how huge the bag is if you know the size of a Mr. Spock Mego doll. (Eight inches approx.)

Saturday, July 25, 2009

I'm not going to try to write exact quotes, or in order - but I can give an overview to what was discussed by the group. Let me start with this: the panel was great. It was a lot of fun to see them all together, and it's clear they enjoy working with each other. This is in my opinion the funniest cast on television right now, and their answers were hilarious. I can't do their humor justice, so I'm just going to convey the information as best I can.Most of the questions and conversation centered around Jim Parsons and Sheldon. Early on, someone congratulated him for his Emmy nomination, and at least twice people told him they were certain he would win. He was asked what Sheldon would do if he was nominated, and Jim said Sheldon would think it was ludicrous to have any sort of nominations for others at all - just the idea that he had "peers" was ridiculous. Asked what he would do with his award when he won, Jim said he'd like to have it out where his friends could handle and "play" with it, because nobody ever does that. also, he said he would -never- refuse it, or give it back, even if he felt someone else deserved it. (All in a very charming way, of course).

We also learned that Sheldon's creepy fake smile (best seen when Kuthrapali wins an award) was inspired by a real-life driving safety poster of an insane-looking clown the cast encountered in Rome near the Coliseum. Seriously. Jim performed the smile (not this), but it took him awhile because everyone was laughing.

They were all asked if they were real geeks themselves, growing up. They (the boys) pretty much all confessed to being Star Wars fans as kids. Simon (Wolowitz) said when he was little he carried a Luke Skywalker figure everywhere and called it his "man." Kunal (Koothrappali) had a Millenium Falcon when he was little - and that's pretty much all I remember him saying. Actually, they almost all spoke so low you could barely hear him, and Kaley's microphone was adjusted for her once so we could hear her better.

Kaley said that when she looked really confused by the guys on the show, she wasn't acting. She was actually confused. Also, when someone prefaced their question with "Kaley, you're hot!" She gave a long answer then ended with: "And you're hot too." Miming winks and "call me" signs. Much laughter.

They were asked if the 9:30 time slot would allow some of the relationships on the show to be "consummated" (would there be more sex) and they said they enjoyed the innocence of the show and it wouldn't really change.

A college student asked why the shows couldn't be viewed for free online, in whole episodes, because he didn't have a TV because he was broke. Chuck or Bill (I think) asked everyone in the audience to give him a dollar.

Someone asked if they would do a location shoot at Six Flags Physics of Fun Days. Bill said location shoots were a horrible inconvenience to them, and when they shot in the little park right next to their stage on the Warners lot, it was a big deal. This lead to a long discussion about how odd it was when the Brady Bunch went to Hawaii and the Grand Canyon, or the Facts of Life went to Russia. Somehow, this lead to a discussion of their car scenes, which are generally not shot in front of the audience, but with a green screen at another time. On the night of the taping they end up performing the car scene with a couple of folding chairs and a stick with a wheel on it for the audience. Kaley and Jim really enjoyed doing these, he said it felt like performing an old vaudeville show.

Someone asked if they could do an episode with Sheldon getting jury duty, and they said they thought about it, but the problem with a jury show is you take a character and put them with a bunch of people not as funny as the rest of the regular cast. This idea sort of lead to the DMV episode for Sheldon.

Simon got a huge round of applause for his character "Moist" in Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along-Blog. He cautioned the crowd to be careful about shouting "Moist" in public.

Asked if they were much like their characters, Simon said he wasn't, and Jim said he wasn't then realized the way he rationalized denying it sounded very much like Sheldon.

Someone asked if Sheldon would ever get a girlfriend, it was stated it was pretty much decided Sheldon was one of those whose work was his life, and "science was his girlfriend." (They expanded on this back at the Paley festival; I'll write up an overview of that soon).

Someone asked Johnny who else from Roseanne he would like to work with on BBT. He seemed to really like the question. He said they were all great to work with, but you just couldn't go wrong with John Goodman, he was just so funny.

Somehow, they got into talking about how Johnny felt at home at anyone's place (I think they said 'except his own') and that he would fall asleep at any of their places - even the dog licking his face didn't wake him. I think Simon joked when they licked his face, it didn't wake him either.

They were asked if they watched themselves on TV, and Jim said he did every Monday - he loved seeing the story that way for the first time; while acting it you never saw the whole thing, basically.

Their favorite episodes - they pretty much all said the Christmas episode (The Bath Item Gift Hypothesis), but Jim said the Vegas Renormalization was his. (I think he likes to hear Kaley sing "Soft Kitty.")

This is the moment when Jim looked right at me (as you can see here) and recognized me from the two tapings I attended, plus signing my program at the Paley festival.

Just kidding. I love this show. I hope this was fun for any who couldn't make it, and be sure to check Youtube for clips. They're hysterical.

First of all, the panel started at 1:00 PM on Friday, five minutes after the Battlestar Galactica panel ended. They don't clear the room between panels, and I'd say 80 percent of the people from Battlestar stayed for Big Bang Theory. People were waiting as much as 4 hours for BBT, so I'm guessing if you only waited 3 hours, you might not have gotten in.

The panel was hosted by Mike Mignolla, creator of Hellboy comics. Why? Because he's a big fan. He said he had seen one taping, and they provided all the Hellboy merchandise they could to the show, so in the comic book store set, Hellboy is visible in every shot. Also, with Hellboy mentioned in one episode, he was cool to his (15 year old?) daughter - for about ten minutes.

Followed by Jim Parsons.This little photo shows Johnny taking a shot of Jim as he comes out.He also shot Kaley's entrance.Simon Helberg also enjoyed the crowd's response to his entrance.And of course Kunal Nayyar.

After showing a clip reel mostly of especially comic-book geekish moments from the show - including any mention of the San Diego Comic Con - and introducing the cast, it was basically questions and answers. First Mike asked questions, then they were handed over to the audience, who had some great ones. You can also view a lot of clips here.

The biggest laugh, as I've already said, was probably when a fan asked Jim Parsons to "use" a napkin so they could retrieve his DNA and clone him - like Sheldon was so excited to have Leonard Nimoy's napkin for. He complied, and Kaley was good enough to wipe his brow with it before it was returned to the audience member.

The photos are looking ok, considering I shot them of the big screen in the lecture hall.

As you can see, the camera looks MUCH better than the phone picture below. Why did they put Sheldon behind the pole? This is inside the WB booth, right where the cast signing was to take place later. (I still don't know if the signing went well!). I'm glad I picked up that cable.

Report on the Big Bang Theory panel at Comic Con coming today. I have to run out and get a mini USB cable to download the pics & and movies from my camera. A couple tidbits from my twitter feed at fancollectrgeek:

Absolute high point of the BBT panel yesterday: a fan asked Parsons to use a napkin so they could get his DNA and clone him... and he did. Kaley Cuoco was kind enough to use it to wipe the sweat from Jim's brow, and it was passed back to the requestor. Start scanning Ebay! :)

Above: the horribly fuzzy picture my cell phone took of the Big Bang Theory art inside the WB booth. Let's see how much better my camera took later!

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

The Michael Jackson collection is temporarily being suspended for the San Diego Comic Con. I will be going down on Thursday and Friday, and probably one day on the weekend.

Last year, I posted a picture a day from the Con for several days after I went. This year, I will be posting them live on Twitter. Please follow me there at fancollectrgeek - same name as this blog, but without the second "O."

Moving forward, this Twitter will be used for short updates and picture posting of all things fancollectorgeeky, including the Big Bang Theory Forum at the Comic Con on Friday at 1:00 PM Pacific time!

Coming soon for Big Bang Theory fans here, I'll have an account of the Paley Festival Big Bang Theory night (complete with blurry Iphone pictures), and more collectibles. Like these ping pong paddles - a gift to the cast and crew. Kaley Cuoco gave one of these to Ellen Degeneres on her show. She saidwn the cast and crew play ping pong on their breaks, and I've seen the table and paddles by the "back" door at Stage 25 on the Warner lot. (Also, this summer, the stage was completely empty, except for several pieces hanging on the back wall including the giant "Physics Bowl" banner from the episode "The Bat Jar Conjecture." Today I peeked in at lunch, and the sets are going back up.

So, I hope you'll follow on Twitter, if you find this stuff interesting, and I'll be sharing as much as I can both there and here after the Con!

Monday, July 20, 2009

Hey long time readers - remember back when FCG was about more than just the preview of Michael Jackson's cancelled auction? Well, it will be again soon. I'm only getting these up here while still relevant, and also - it's helping me to get used to posting more frequently. I'd like to be updating this at least 3 times a week, normally, and I have plenty of good stuff to get to. (Hint: Big Bang Theory). So, this is the penultimate look at Michael's stuff - we'll wrap it up tomorrow, then on to coverage of the San Diego Comic Con 2009.

Another giant room of the abandoned department store holding this preview was full of "kid's stuff" - games and things. Like, this odd generic slush machine. I guess Michael couldn't afford a Slurpee or Icee machine? (Or even Slush Puppy?)

Blurred photo of walls of pinball machines. The blue and red blur on the wall was a framed autographed photo of Christopher Reeve, the matte falling apart.The instant photo booth actually kind of creeped me out a little.

But, I rather like the John Romita-esque Spider-man on the wall.Another photo booth.Odd robot shaped toy dispensing machine.Odd military man shaped toy dispensing machine.Ziggy the clown toy machine.As you can see, tons of arcade games - and is that a Power Ranger?This is a real person - Rob, who went to the auction with me. (He was anonymous back in part one, but he told me he didn't mind being shown). More vehicles - bikes and a bike/cart thing. Hey, there's Darth Vader (Return of the Jedi era, seated) and Darth made out of Legos (standing).I don't know how they chose which little cars went inside, and which were parked out in the sun (back in part 1)Luigi and monkey toy dispensing machine.Hey - a slot machine! Like for grown-ups!Another view of the pedal car.Remember Virtual Boy?A big ride on type video game - never really seen one of these before.No surprise to see a couple of ETs there.Oh, and there's a C-3Po standing by the Darths we saw in the distance before. you know - there are a heck of a lot of fake people from Neverland Ranch here......there's a Spider-man. And remember all the Michael Jackson's?And a Lara Croft.......Marilyn Monroe, Superman in the back...Bruce Lee sporting a Jacko-type hat......um, Willy Wonka?Elvis Presley-A particularly unnerving old animated baby doll.And remember the statues of servants I mentioned before? You can see at least five of them in this picture!And all the kids statues that were outside? There were even more inside. It's weird, but...even if nobody was there, there were a lot of people at Neverland Ranch.

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